"U.S. wealth
concentration seems to have returned to levels last seen during the Roaring
Twenties."
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin stands with others during
a state dinner at the White House on Tuesday, April 24, 2018, in Washington,
DC. Many 2020 presidential candidates are pushing taxation on the rich to
reduce the US's staggering inequality.
As survey data continues to
show that raising taxes on the wealthy is extremely
popular among the U.S. public, new research by inequality expert and
University of California, Berkeley economist Gabriel Zucman found that the
richest 0.00025 percent of the American population now owns more wealth than
the 150 million adults in the bottom 60 percent.
Zucman, who helped Sen.
Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) develop her
"Ultra-Millionaire Tax" proposal, observed in a working paper (pdf)
that "U.S. wealth concentration seems to have returned to levels last seen
during the Roaring Twenties."
According to Zucman's
research, the richest 0.00025 percent—just 400 Americans—have seen their share
of America's national wealth triple since the 1980s, while the wealth of much
of the U.S. population has stagnated or declined.
As the Washington Post's
Christopher Ingraham noted in
a breakdown of Zucman's research, adults in the bottom 60 percent of the wealth
distribution "saw their share of the nation's wealth fall from 5.7 percent
in 1987 to 2.1 percent in 2014."
Consolidation of wealth at the
very top, Ingraham observes, "is eroding security from families in the
lower and middle classes, who rely on their small stores of wealth to finance
their retirement and to smooth over economic shocks like the loss of a job. And
it's consolidating power in the hands of the nation’s billionaires, who are
increasingly using their riches to purchase political influence."
Zucman's research comes as
members of Congress and 2020 presidential candidates are pushing a variety of
plans to begin reducing America's staggering wealth and income inequality by
raising taxes on those at the very top.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren
(D-Mass.), who officially
launched her 2020 presidential campaign on Saturday, has proposed an
annual tax of two percent on assets over $50 million.
Last month, Sen. Bernie
Sanders (I-Vt.)—who is reportedly close
to announcing his 2020 candidacy—introduced the
For the 99.8% Act, which would establish a 77 percent tax on all estates over
$1 billion.
And Rep. Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has
suggested imposing a top marginal tax rate of 70 percent on those who
make over $10 million.
Pointing to polling
data showing that 76 percent of Americans believe the rich should pay
more in taxes, Indivisible's Chad Bolt concluded: "Raising taxes on the
wealthy isn't just good policy. It's also good politics."
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